By 2319, he had reached the rank of commander, and was sent to negotiate the release of hostages from Mordan IV. Officially, he successfully negotiated their release. However, in truth he supplied weapons to Karnas, the hostage-taker, in return for their release, and falsified the official records. This was a violation of the Prime Directive, so Jameson made an attempt to even things up by also supplying weapons to Karnas' rivals, thus causing forty years of civil war, although he claimed that he had assumed that the resulting conflict would last for only a few years before it ended.

When Karnas reported a hostage situation on Mordan IV in 2364, he took both doses and embarked on the USS Enterprise-D to negotiate for their release, at Karnas' request, in an attempt to vindicate himself. The medicine caused him to rapidly get younger, but was also highly unstable, his unstable health prompting him to admit the truth to Picard, who acknowledged Jameson's responsibility for the current state of affairs while also noting that Karnas and others could have chosen to work for peace rather than simply continuing to fight.

After learning that the hostages had actually been taken by Karnas in an attempt to lure him to Mordan IV, he mounted an armed rescue attempt. This failed, and by the time he met Karnas face to face, he was dying from the effects of the drug. Karnas, on seeing Jameson die in front of him and on hearing of his attempts to atone for his earlier deeds, was satisfied and released the hostages. Jameson was buried on Mordan IV, at the request of his wife, and with Karnas' permission. (TNG: "Too Short a Season")

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In the first draft script of "Too Short a Season", Jameson's first name was "Paul". [1] He was renamed "Mark" by the time the revised final draft of the script was issued. [2]

In a scene that was included in the revised final draft script of "Too Short a Season" but not in the episode's final edit, Jameson was mentioned to have been the commanding officer of the USS Falcon and the USS Pegasus, in addition to serving as an admiral. [3]